


Blood is Compulsory

by ivoryandhorn



Category: The New Albion Radio Hour: A Dieselpunk Opera - Shapera
Genre: Drabble, Gen, metatextual wankery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-27
Updated: 2013-06-27
Packaged: 2020-10-12 21:10:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20570957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivoryandhorn/pseuds/ivoryandhorn
Summary: Lloyd was the narrator; he'd never been her friend.





	Blood is Compulsory

The price of tragedy—any tragedy—was blood. She'd known that, when she'd persuaded Lloyd to let Constance live. She'd known that, too, when she stepped forward to fight by John's side, for whatever brief time she could. She'd know that even as her gun ran out of bullets, even as she felt the howling of ghosts waiting for her to join them in death, their cries louder, louder, hungry. When she died so Constance could live, so the little tragedy of her demise could flavor the victory of the rebels, she knew better than to feel betrayed. Lloyd was the narrator; he'd never been her friend.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to Dreamwidth in 2013.
> 
> The title comes from _Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead_, itself a masterpiece of traitorous narrators and metatextual wankery: "We're more of the love, blood, and rhetoric school. Well, we can do you blood and love without the rhetoric, and we can do you blood and rhetoric without the love, and we can do you all three concurrent or consecutive. But we can't give you love and rhetoric without the blood. Blood is compulsory. They're all blood, you see."


End file.
